DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claims 1-20 are pending.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1, 3, 7-10, 12, 16-18, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Potlapally et al. (US 2014/0245425).
With respect to claim 1, Potlapally discloses: receiving, by communications hardware, a first datagram comprising a first request for entropy and a set of requirements comprising an indication of an endpoint device, an indication of a number of bits of entropy, and an indication of a quality of the entropy ([0050] “data pull” corresponds to request; [0051] length of bits corresponds to number of bits; [0027] “quality” and “request” is also disclosed);
determining, by routing circuitry, whether a first entropy source from a set of entropy sources meets the set of requirements (Fig. 10, “1004”, “1007”);
determining, by priority circuitry, a first priority value based on the first request ([0081], lines 39-41: “…clients…granted higher priority for random data”;
determining, by the priority circuitry, whether the first priority value is a greatest available priority value ([0081], higher priority corresponds to highest value);
in an instance in which the first entropy source does not meet the set of requirements and the first priority value is the greatest available priority value, causing generation, by entropy quality circuitry, of an admixture of a plurality of entropy sources from the set of entropy sources, wherein the admixture meets the set of requirements ([0074], [0075], [0081]; for higher paying clients a higher priority access is given to higher quality random data. When locally generated random data is available, consumer requirements based on pricing/billing considerations may require use of higher quality service provided data which is from producers of pool of data or through service data aggregators, i.e., the local source does not meet the clients requirements and due to the clients higher priority by virtue of paying more, entropy sources such as producer pools and/or service data aggregators external to the local source are selected as the entropy sources); and
providing, by the communications hardware, the admixture to the endpoint device as a response to the first request (id.).
With respect to claim 3, Potlapally discloses: wherein the first request further comprises an indication of a blocking property, the method further comprising: in the instance in which the first entropy source does not meet the set of requirements and the first priority value is the greatest available priority value, determining, by the entropy quality circuitry, that the admixture meeting the set of requirements is possible to generate based on the set of entropy sources (Fig. 13).
With respect to claim 7, Potlapally discloses: receiving, by the communications hardware, the indication of the quality of the entropy from the first entropy source ([0027]).
With respect to claim 8, Potlapally discloses: wherein the set of entropy sources comprises an onsite entropy source and a cloud entropy source ([0085]- [0086]).
With respect to claim 9, Potlapally discloses: wherein the set of requirements further comprises an indication of a distribution and an indication of bias ([0049], “preferred” corresponds to “bias”).
With respect to claims 10, 12, 16, and 17, they recite similar limitations as claims 1, 3, 7, and 8, respectively, and are therefore rejected under the same citations and rationale.
With respect to claims 18 and 20, they recite similar limitations as claims 1 and 3, respectively, and are therefore rejected under the same citations and rationale.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim(s) 5 and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Potlapally et al. (US 2014/0245425) in view of Herbert et al. (US 2010/0332574).
With respect to claim 5, Potlapally does not specifically disclose: receiving, by the communications hardware, a testing sample of entropy from the first entropy source; and executing, by testing circuitry, a quality test based on the testing sample to determine a tested quality related to the first entropy source, wherein determining whether the first entropy source meets the set of requirements is further based on the tested quality related to the first entropy source.
However, Herbert discloses: receiving, by the communications hardware, a testing sample of entropy from the first entropy source; and executing, by testing circuitry, a quality test based on the testing sample to determine a tested quality related to the first entropy source, wherein determining whether the first entropy source meets the set of requirements is further based on the tested quality related to the first entropy source ([0070]).
It would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to incorporate the teachings of Herbert to ensure the entropy data is of sound quality or at least the quality the client prefers by testing two entropy source samples.
With respect to claim 14, it recites similar limitations as claim 5 and is therefore rejected under the same citations and rationale.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2, 4, 6, 11, 13, 15, and 19 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: The prior art, alone or in any reasonable combination with the limitations of the independent claims, does not disclose that the client requirements comprises a minimum and maximum quality and determining a quality of the admixture based on the first priority value, the minimum acceptable quality, and the maximum acceptable quality. Any prior art that may disclose such a limitation cannot be combinable as such a combination would be utilizing impermissible hindsight reasoning to justify said combination. In addition, Potlapally discloses only one tier of quality for each type of client, not a range. Any prior art that discloses such a range would teach away from Potlapally’s single tier quality requirement per client.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Mikhailove et al. (US 2017/0085654): Sharing entropy between an entropy broker and various devices are disclosed. The entropy broker receives a communication from a client. Responsive to determining that the client provided entropy, the entropy broker processes the provided entropy and responsive to determining that the client requested entropy, the entropy broker adds the client to an entropy queue.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to WISSAM RASHID whose telephone number is (571)270-3758. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 8:00 am-5:00 pm.
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/WISSAM RASHID/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2195
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